


Figments of the Improbable

by Picpicpic



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Asexual(?)Sherlock, Baker Street, Demisexual(?)Sherlock, Detox, Grief/Mourning, He's unsure, Hospitals, Letters, Memory, Mention of drinking, Missing, Music, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Reichenbach, Recovery, Relationship Talk, Reunion, Scars, Therapy, Voluntary admission, Worry, mention of suicidal thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-03-20
Packaged: 2019-11-15 05:02:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 8,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18067070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Picpicpic/pseuds/Picpicpic
Summary: After Sherlock jumps off the roof of Barts hospital, a broken-hearted John withdraws from the world into his own head.





	1. Loops

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FinAmour](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FinAmour/gifts).



> There was a tweet asking about heartbreak a few days ago. This is a reply of sorts...  
> I promise it has a happy ending.
> 
>  
> 
> Please head the tags. Tags will update along with the chapters. This fic will deal with grief and mental instability. It's won't get too graphic, but pls take care of yourself when reading.  
> Chapters will start short and get a bit longer as we go. 
> 
> This has not Beta-ed nor Brit-picked. My apologies.

**Figments of the Improbable**

(A comment on Heartbreak)

**1| Loops**

The first week after Sherlock had jumped off the roof of Barts Hospital, John’s mind was racing with hurtful loops: His own pathetic mutterings _‘Let me through, please, he’s my friend’_ ; to which Sherlock’s ringing voice spat _‘Friends,'_  as though venomous, just as he had done at the sitting room of the Grimpen Inn. Then John’s voice would grit out, like he did that last day, _‘Friends protect people’_. And then, most painful and deserved, came John’s scolding to himself _: ‘Some friend you turned out to be, John.’_  ‘ _You didn’t protect him.’_ ‘ _What good did your friendship do him, John?_ ’  
On and on it went, on a loop inside his head, feeding the anger like a kindled ember.

The second week, John was furious. Furious with Moriarty, furious with the Yard, furious with Kitty fucking Riley, with Sherlock, and Mycroft and, most of all, most-of-all, with himself. So furious, in fact, he could not sit still. He had a mission and he set out to fulfil it, make amends to a lost cause, not resting until it was done.

It took four months to clear Sherlock’s name. Four months in which John’s fury pushed him forward relentlessly. He’d pleaded and begged and demanded and yelled and pushed at everyone and everything – Lestrade, The Yard’s archivists, Journalists and publicists, lawyers and desk clerks and secretaries, and more than anyone, at Mycroft, to do anything and everything possible, to bring the truth to light. To illuminate Moriarty’s web of lies and clear Sherlock’s name. Until -

_‘Vindicated and cleared of all suspicion.’_

 

 

 Three weeks later, John disappeared.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my first Sherlock fanfiction.. please be kind. I would love to hear your thoughts and experiences. Corrections of content and grammar are also appreciated if they're done in the form of constructive criticism.


	2. Gone

**2| Gone**

Of course, it was Mrs Hudson who’d noticed. She had heard the door close one day, and it hadn’t open again in two weeks. The stairs didn’t creek, there were no footfalls upstairs. John had not told her anything, but that was not so unusual anymore. Another week went by before she calls his cellphone, but John was not picking up. Then she goes up to 221b, to find it closed and stale and empty. No John. No sign of living. No coming, no going. The fridge empty, the fireplace cold. A crass row of dusty, sticky, empty bottles of Whisky on the kitchen floor, the last evidence of a pained existence.

At the end of that week, she calls Molly Hooper, Sherlock and John’s nice friend, to ask if she perhaps had heard from John. It wasn’t that she was worried about the rent, it was that she was worried about John. Molly answers calmly that she hadn’t, and then calls Lestrade to check with him, worried.

Lestrade comes to Baker Street, to try and see if he could find any clues, less polite and guilty about snooping around. Except for a few clothing and personal items of Johns (had he packed a bag?), it seems everything Lestrade could think of is accounted for. He finds John’s wallet and cellphone in the drawer of his night-stand. Exhaling with relief when, next to them, he finds John’s gun.

It seems, John had left and didn’t mean to be found. Perhaps, Lestrade thinks sadly, John’d felt there was nothing here anymore, without Sherlock. He then fights a tinge of insult and frustration at the thought that John did not see in him something worth staying for. Someone, at least, to let know he was going away. Though he can’t blame John either; things had not been good, or even easy between them, even after clearing Sherlock’s name. He had felt John’s rage at first hand both before and after Sherlock’s death. In the months leading to Sherlock’s death, he had found himself between a rock and hard place, having to tread carefully and, eventually, having to choose. And he’d chosen wrong. He’d chosen wrong and let both his friends down, and it had a disastrous result. John ire was deserved and rightfully directed at him, and had, at least, meant John had cared enough to rage. Now Lestrade begins to worry. Enough to make an unusual call.

Mycroft grits his teeth but refuses to worry. But eventually agrees to look at the CCTV to find John leaving, not promising anything else to Greg. His quest is only partly helpful; John had left Baker Street one morning, (even pausing shortly to wave grimly at the camera across from 221b,) had gotten on the Hammersmith and City line, switching to the Overground at Whitechapel and succeeded to avoid being caught on camera as he disappeared into South London.


	3. Money Trail

**3| Money Trail**

A partial answer came the next month, when an alert connected to John’s bank account goes off, informing Mycroft the monthly transfer-order for Baker street has been cancelled. Another alert tells him a new transfer-order has been set to an institution in the city’s outer-rim: A private Psychiatric Clinic and Detox Centre.

An alert pings off at the end of six weeks, what Mycroft had researched to be the longest standard course of treatment for Alcohol detoxication programs. Yet nothing seems to change. Six and a half months after Sherlock’s jump, John’s quickly dwindling money keeps being transferred to pay for his stay at the isolated clinic.

Mycroft will soon have to intervene, against his own wishes, in order to keep his promise to his brother. Against John’s wishes, as well, he assumes, as John makes no attempt to contact anyone who had known Sherlock, nor, it seemed, to come out of his self-enforced institutionalization.


	4. Routine

**4| Routine**

John likes being in the clinic. It’s quiet, the rules are easy to follow, and no one wanted anything unreasonable from him. He’d quickly kicked his habit because there wasn’t any alcohol to be found, and he didn’t have the energy or will-power to go searching for it. He doesn’t have the will-power for anything really. He knows not to linger too much on those pathetic nights of detox, taking them for what they were - pathetic. They’d blended into one another as his body screeched for release from the burning in his guts, and worse, from the cruelty of his mind, which had been determined to loop-play Sherlock at his brilliant and most beautiful.

Without the drink to drown them out, his nightmares soon come back, as does his ever-worsening limp. Vivid images of gunfire and splattered blood, of looking down gun barrels and being squeezed into explosive-vests, of swishing black, flared coats and the smashing of bone against the asphalt, keep him up through the nights, leave him exhausted and haunted and in pain.

But the rules also say he isn’t forced to talk to anyone outside his weekly personal therapy with Dr Stravinsky if he doesn’t want to. He doesn’t mind the nurses coming in and out of his small, single room, checking on him, talking to him politely even if he doesn’t respond. He does hear, does comply when needed, and they don’t bother him much. They make sure he gets up in the morning, encourage him to shower and dress – things he’s quite sure he’d otherwise give up. They don’t bother him too much about food, either. Though they do notice as new holes appear on his belt.

 

He doesn’t often make use of his professional knowledge. Not his area here. But he had known what to say to the doctors to allow him to stay after the excuse of detox was exhausted:  _“There is a gun, in the second drawer of my nightstand, I don’t trust myself not to use.”_ Was the reason he’d given when he asked to be admitted to the closed ward once he was clean.

\--

“ _Penance,_ ” was the answer he’d given when his therapist asked why he was there, making it clear he could not go on with his silence during his personal sessions.

_“What for?”  she tries,_ but does not receive an answer.

\--

_“Why did you come here?”_ Stravinsky tries again in another session, _“Why did you give up drinking?”_

_“It was too easy.”_

_“Too easy?”_

_“Yes.”_

_“Could you explain?”_

_“Too easy to forget. Too easy on me.”_

_\--_

_“Why do you feel you deserve the pain you’re in, John?”_ She asks again, over and over, insistent yet patient.

_“Because I couldn’t protect him.”_ He finally relents one day. _“Was a shit friend when he needed me the most.”_

_\--_

_“Do you know what day it is, John?”_

_“Yes.”_

_“Can you tell me?”_

_“219”_

_“What?”_

_“It’s day 219 since Sherlock jumped.”_

_\--_

_“What stopped you from you using the gun, John?”_

_“Would have been too easy as well.”_

_\--_

_“What do you need the pain for, John?”_

_“It reminds me.”_

_“Of him? Are you afraid to forget Sherlock?”_

_“No, I could never forget him.”_

_“Then what does the pain remind you?”_

_“That I failed him. I failed Sherlock Holmes. My friend.”_

 --

Except for personal therapy, John is free to do as he pleases with his time. The days go by and John is in no hurry to do anything. He sits for days in his room, drifting in and out of sleep after his nightmares keep him awake. He raids the library, going through the books much quicker than he had at home, without Sherlock to ruin the end of each and every one. He walks the gardens when his leg, the doctors and the weather allow it. He’s not eager to think but does no fight it when the thoughts do come. Doesn’t fight it when it’s Sherlock that fills his head. Soon, he takes time to observe like Sherlock had taught him: the patients, the nurses, the volunteers and workshop leaders. The flow of the day, the ins and outs of the machine that is the closed ward. Slowly he collects his information, gathering secrets and conclusions.

Encouraged to take part in group therapy (which he doesn’t), or in the various activities available throughout the day, he tries his hand at painting and beading and knitting and finds it’s not for him. Then one day he stumbles into a writing workshop and receives a pen and paper and the task to write a letter. Writing comes as easily as it always has. Allowing him to put his thoughts in order, to sort through his experiences, to talk without talking...


	5. Letters

**5| Letters**

The first letter arrives at Baker Street 8 months after Sherlock had jumped. Mrs Hudson is surprised to tears to see Sherlock’s name written across the envelope, too terrified and respectful to open it, she pities and envies the poor soul who doesn’t know that Sherlock is no longer with them. Not knowing what to do with it, she reverently leaves it on the mantelpiece in 221b.

_Dear Sherlock,_

_Oh, I’ve missed writing. The weight of a pen between my fingers, the whiteness of the paper, inviting me, tempting me, to scar it with my words. Hand-writing is much more active, I find, demanding much more involvement, than typing on a computer. Though you’d probably ~~find~~ have found the tempo of my penmanship as infuriating as that of my two-fingered typing…  I don’t have a computer here, anyway. Left it back at Baker Street. _

_It’s odd to write to you in the past tense, Sherlock. I relive our time together in my head so often, I sometimes forget it’s in the past. Please forgive me such mistakes of tense and grammar when such occasions do occur._

_I’m not sure I have much to tell, yet I am eager to write to you, Sherlock, talk to you, feel as if you’re at reach. In another room perhaps. Sometimes when it’s quiet here, when no one is doing something extremely out of order, or being impossibly loud, I imagine you are sitting at the kitchen table, just on the other side of the wall, so absorbed in your work, in the curious potentiality of science - (‘Sentiment,’ I imagine you’d say to this description. Correcting me – ‘it’s about precision, John, needed accuracy,’) - you forget to eat, or drink. The teacups I make you, steeped to perfection, line up on the table, like dutiful soldiers on parade, patiently awaiting their leader._

_I do sometimes, still, make two cups of tea instead of just the one. But I cannot bring myself to chuck the extra one out. I leave it there, standing._

_As I wrote, at times a tenant here will lose him- or herself and become loud and irritated. But I don’t hold that against them. I know of the need to yell and shout. Recognize the anger that confusion may bring on. The feeble attempts to set the world back in order, to overcome the unbearable drone of everything, are not foreign to me. I too am loud as I wake from gruelling nightmares. So, I lay no blame at the people around me. They can do no more against their confusion than I against my terror.  I know you would not have liked to read such sentiment, Sherlock, such bland exposure of weakness. But you are dead, my dearest friend, and I find I am not as strong as I used to be._

_though I am not sure you’d want me, I am, still, faithfully yours,_

_John H. Watson_

 

**\--**

_Dear Sherlock,_

_It’s been nine months to the day since that day. I’m sorry I cannot come to visit you at your grave, but I talk to you all the time in my head, I don’t think you’d resent me over geography._

_I’ve officially read through the library here. Every single book from the crappy detective stories to the ‘Clinical Guide of Mental Disorders’, which was quite an eye-opener. I’m sure it could have, at points, helped with the Work. God, I hate the Work now._

_I have found a piano, though, hiding away here. It helps stave the boredom without any books._

_The volunteer that comes to teach music was kind enough to tune it for me. It’s not perfect, not by your standards, but I make do. I mostly play the tunes my mother taught me as a child. And some Jazz I picked up along the way. I found a notebook here of ridiculous contemporary pop songs, and sometimes I slowly teach myself to play them._

_I can’t play it like you played your violin. I don’t believe anything will ever again sound as mesmerizing as your music, Sherlock. I’ve never told you this, but there were nights I was sure you were playing for me. Nights, when I’m sure you’d heard me jolt awake from a nightmare, gasping or yelling or yelping at times, and wordlessly, patiently, you’d reach for your violin, and delicately coax tranquillity from the strings. I’d lie awake, listening, grateful, and I’d wonder, Sherlock, what I ever did to deserve you, a friendship such as yours after all the horrible things I’d taken part in in Afghanistan. I don’t know why I never told you, never thanked you enough for those nights. No one exposed to such nights could ever blame you of being cold or heartless or machine-like. And I did, I did, and I am so sorry. I am so so sorry, Sherlock. It’s too late now. It will forever be too late, and I will forever regret saying that to you that day. Leaving you there, alone. That’s on me. Letting you believe you were anything other than extraordinary and incredible and loved. Loved. Dearly._

_I know it means nothing, cowardly admitting to it now, but I loved you then, Sherlock, and I love you still._

_Yours,_

_John H. Watson_

 

**\--**

When the second letter arrives, Mrs Hudson takes pity on the anonymous sender, and passes it on to Mycroft, to see if he can break the news of Sherlock’s death to whoever it is that is writing. For some odd reason, Mycroft, forever too busy to actually appear at 221b, makes the arrangements to keep the payments going on the apartment, saving Mrs Hudson the trouble of finding new tenants. Though it does get awfully quiet at times. And the deserted apartment above her remains cold and closed and gathering dust. If Mycroft does decide to do something with the letter, he never tells her. And if a sudden new donation of an assortment of books, including music notes, arrives at the clinic, John does not make the connection.


	6. London

**6| London**

One year, two months and 13 days after jumping off the roof of Bart’s Hospital, Sherlock arrives back in London. Though it takes another day and a half for him to be aware of it. John’s name comes to his lips an hour later, soon swept away under drug-induced sleep. And again – he wakes briefly, asking for John before pain or pain medication take over. And again. Once, he finds Mycroft sitting at his bedside. He asks again, searching Mycroft’s stern eyes for a response. Once, Molly appears in his room but does not hear him through her tears and snivels. Unhelpful.

It takes him two weeks to be able to hold a conversation. He prods at Mycroft for an answer about John. Panic lacing through his veins at the man’s silence. At the tiny shake of his head. At the heavy inhale, the excruciatingly slow expansion of his lungs. _‘Words,’_ Sherlock begs silently. “ _Not dead,”_ he pleads a sob through his dried lips _. “Please, Mycr- not dead,”_

_“No, brother, not dead.”_

The air crashing into his own lungs with relief makes him dizzy. Too dizzy. Black spots appear in his vision. He’s not sure what his facial expression is, but he can feel Mycroft’s hand gripping his suddenly. _“Rest, Sherlock.”_ And he can’t fight the fatigue any longer.

_\--_

Sherlock is released from the hospital after a month. The fire burning inside him now, prompting him to gather his strength, carries John’s name in its flames. Mycroft hires a crew to clean and air out 221b, and the precious, clever Mrs Hudson knows what’s happening without any need of explanation. _“Is he back, then?”_ she asks, as Mycroft comes to check the flat. Giddy at his silent nod.

The next day, as the black car stops in front of the apartment, she’s already waiting for him, fussing about, the house filled with the comforting smells of baking and home. _“Oh, Sherlock,”_ she says as she finally sits by his side on the couch, cups of tea and scones on the coffee table in front of them.

_“I’m sorry,”_ he whispers against her hair.

_“I know, love. But the important thing is you’re here. and that you eat something. You’re so skinny.”_

_“When have you last seen John?”_ he asks, his voice trembling.

_“John? Not in months, Sherlock.”_

\--

He finds John’s letter, still laying on the mantlepiece and interrogates Mycroft for the rest until piece by piece he adds up the missing details of John’s current life.

_\--_

In his most Sherlockian action since coming back, Sherlock breaks into Dr Stravinsky office at the clinic to read through her notes about John. He flickers through the pages collecting words, gathering impressions, accumulating Data about John’s condition.

»Voluntary admission«; »Substance addiction detoxication«; »Self-imposed hospitalization«; »Reduced appetite; weight loss. Possible need for intervention«; »Growing reclusiveness«; »Reluctance to speak in sessions;«; »Indifference concerning Self; Increasing? No. Upon observation, lethargy does not seem to turn into self-neglect. Nor does it seem to affect care for others: Patient helped calm a wounded patient after a seizure, applying his medical knowledge when needed«; »Partial engagement in individual activities«; »Increased engagement in writing letters; consistency sending letters to former residence address: 221b Baker Street«; »Rise in self-talk. At times, seems to involve a second addressee. _Sherlock_?«; »Hallucinations?«; »History of psychosomatic pain in the left bottom extremity. Pain seems to subside sporadically but is otherwise constant. Deterioration in use of the leg. No pain medication administered upon patient request«;

\--

Unable to visit John in the tight conditions of his self-inflicted prison without making his presence known, Sherlock prompts Mycroft to release to the media the fact of his return. Then he requests a meeting with Stravinsky, to allow him to see John, allow him (ir)regular visiting rights, the conditions to bring John home.


	7. Sherlock

**7| Sherlock**

And then, one morning, on day 476, when John is just finishing making his bed, Sherlock appears in his room; Black hair, black suit, white shirt, meticulous.   
Slimmer than John had remembered, but that’s ok; John is thinner too. His mind must be compensating.   
Sherlock’s eyes are hollow and worried, - as are John’s. Fluttering over him to take him in, collecting observations, working through silent deductions.   
John smiles at the thought. It’s been a long time. He’s not sure why it’s happened today, after all this time, but he’s not going to waste time doubting it. Or fighting it. He’s glad he can still conjure Sherlock’s image so well. He closes his eyes and opens them again, to check.

 _“Sherlock,”_ John exhales with relief at the sight of him, a shy grin spreading on his lips. He makes his way to Sherlock without hesitation, stopping in front of him just shortly, to check what happens when he reaches out. He can feel the cloth of Sherlock’s black suit jacket. Feel the firmness of muscle underneath it. It’s all he needs, really. He wraps his arms around Sherlock’s torso, pressing himself into Sherlock's chest. _“I’m so happy you’re here. That you’ve finally come. Thank you.”_

 

It’s not at all what Sherlock had expected. Obviously. Disbelief, anger, a punch to the nose, were more the responses he’d anticipated. But there’s no surprise in John’s reaction. Only a resigned acceptance and relief. As if he’d been waiting for it. As if pieces had finally fallen into place. As if he couldn’t quite see those pieces were not only in his head.

Unaccustomed to such proximity to John yet so, so, thankful for it, Sherlock raises his arms to wrap around John’s shoulders with relief and gratitude. He winces as John’s arms press against his healing scars but does not flinch or stop John from doing so. He never will. _They needn’t fix it all right now_ , he thinks. In this cherished moment, it is enough to feel John’s heart beating, feel a warmth to his body, to be allowed to be here, to touch and hold. To be held. 

_\--_

As the days go by, John doesn’t question Sherlock’s coming and going, doesn’t assign it to mundane things as visiting hours or daylight. He’s content in believing his mind is sometimes busy enough to let Sherlock remain disembodied, while other times he conjures Sherlock at his fullest, finest form. Then John clings to him for as long as possible. His favourite is to lie against Sherlock on his bed and imagine the breath filling his lungs again, rising and falling, lulling John into his own thoughts.

 _“Why aren’t you angry with me, John?”_ Sherlock hesitantly asks one day.

 _“I don’t want to be angry now,”_ John answers calmly. _“I was angry, I was furious. And then I cleared your name, and it didn’t help. I was angry until I wasn’t anymore. Slowly the anger lost its force. Dwindled down into nothingness. Emptiness. And I drank, and it still didn’t help.”_ He sighs and sounds so tired, resigned. _“Now I want to love you,”_ he adds. _“I didn’t want to love you before, because I was afraid you’d leave. Now you’re gone and I’m not afraid anymore. Now I can love you like I couldn’t before. Now I just love you. And it does help.”_

_“I’m right here, John.”_

_“Mm, I know. I like that you’re in my head because I can keep you here, safe, for as long as I like. Forever.”_

_“No, John, I’m here. Me. Here. Real. Not just in your head.”_

_“No, Sherlock, you’re dead. I saw you jump, I saw your skull splattered on the ground. Felt you pulse fading out under my fingers. I’m very happy you’re here, and I don’t mind it’s just in my head.”_ John answers calmly and the resignation in his voice breaks Sherlock's heart and makes him want to shake John and yell. But John is so fragile right now. Holding on to the one probability his mind can still handle, and Sherlock does not have that heart to hurt him any more ever again.

 _“Sleep, now, John.”_ He says, watching as John’s eyes flutter closed, a soft smile of content tugging at his lips. _“I’ll be here again tomorrow.”_

 _“Mm,”_ John answers in assent, nodding, fading into sleep.

\--

One morning Sherlock finds John sitting in a wheelchair staring out a window, his leg giving him too much pain to trouble with the cane. It’s just too much. _“Oh, John, what have you done?”_ he murmurs as he sinks to his knees at John’s side. John startles at the sudden proximity, and then relaxes, instinctively leaning into the comfort of Sherlock warmth.

 _“Not enough, Sherlock.”_ John shakes in his arms, his fingers fuss with the fabric of Sherlock’s suit. _“I’m sorry I didn’t do enough.”_

 _“No, John, you did.”_ He searches for a way to backtrack his question, to make John understand. _“You did just fine. You were supposed to stay alive and you have. You’ve done perfectly. Now we can get you home.”_

_“No.”_

Sherlock feels John tense against him. _“What?”_

_“I don’t want to go anywhere else. It’s taken me so long to get you to be here with me. Now you’re here, and I don’t want to be anywhere you aren’t anymore.”_

_“I’ll be with you at Baker Street.”_

_“No. I can’t promise that there. You’re so real here, I can touch you.”_ His fingers skim over Sherlock’s lapel, as though proving it to himself. _“But there, you’ll disappear into the noise of traffic, or the shadows behind the curtains, under the dust moats and into piling bills. You’ll run away when I go out for milk, leave me when I’ll have to be with patients.”_ Sherlock can hear the tinge of panic in his voice. _“No. I’m staying here, where I can have you with me in my head.”_

_“John,"_

_\--_

_“I like that you drink the tea I make you now. No more orphan teacup left standing.”_ John says a week later. _“I missed that,”_

“ _What else do you miss?”_

_“I miss the way you took me for granted – took what was mine, what you wanted when and how you wanted because there was no fear I’d leave, no doubt of my existence next to you.”_

_“Don’t be an idiot, John,”_ Sherlock says, out of habit, because what else could he say, because it hurts too much to say anything else. But John surprises him again.

 _“You used to love that I was an idiot.”_  John chuckles brightly, unfazed by Sherlock's words. “ _I was your idiot, following you around everywhere. And I loved following you. Loved being your idiot. I loved you.”_

This is how John speaks now, Sherlock realized. This is a softer John, a John that has nothing left to fight for or against. A John unafraid and unashamed, and unwilling to miss an opportunity to be truthful with Sherlock. It’s overwhelming. That it’s because John thinks he’s talking to himself, that this is a figment-Sherlock he’s talking to, that he thinks he’d already missed the opportunity, lost it, is in no way reassuring.

 _“I miss not wanting to be anywhere else because I was already by your side.”_ John goes on quietly, _“I miss your music.”_

Finally, something Sherlock can grasp at. He swallows through the thickness in his throat _. “We could play together now, John. I’ve arranged for a piano at Baker Street.”_

_“No,”_


	8. Intervention

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ha, this looks longer in the Word file... hope you're enjoying this story, would love to hear from you...

They convene one morning in the Stravinsky’s office, three weeks after Sherlock’s first visit. Sherlock, so very much at his wits ends about how to make John believe he is alive and real, had requested Mycroft join the meeting. Stravinsky talks brightly about John’s progress, how much more alive John seems during Sherlock’s visits, more engaged.

_“He won’t accept that I exist outside of his mind.”_ Sherlock cuts in, talking over the doctor, to Mycroft, _“I’m at a loss at what to do, to make him eliminate the improbable as an impossibility, and accept the truth.”_ He tugs on his curls in frustration. “ _He can’t stay here. He’s dying. His own resignation is killing him. It’s like he’d be happy to perish here, in his own little world, where he believes he’s talking to me in his head.”_ He suddenly goes very still, and very pale, as realization falls. _“No.”_

_“It’s the only way, Sherlock.”_ Of course, Mycroft had arrived at the solution before him. Insufferable.

_“No. Absolutely not. No.”_ They glare at each other heatedly. A silent battle of wills. _“I can’t do that to him again, Mycroft,”_ Sherlock surrenders miserably. _“Not again.”_

_“He’s comfortably numb in the security of his delusion, Sherlock. And as long as you feed into that illusion, he has no reason to snap out of it. You must break the cycle.”_

_“I cannot disappear on him again, he won’t survive it.”_

_“No, not disappear. But not succumb to disillusion. Lessen the power of what he thinks is the figment of his imagination and strengthen the reality that he cannot control. It’ll be painful, but it’s the only way._


	9. Away

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry,

One day Sherlock isn’t there. Again. John waits and waits for him come, for his image to appear, but to no avail.  
One day, then another. He starts counting the days again from 1. He tries talking to Sherlock, but there is no reply. He runs around at all hours, looking for Sherlock. His mind at a silent loss, unable to turn off. No one takes the second cup of tea he makes; It remains on the counter.  
It’s like detox all over again. Like Sherlock jumping, dying, turning to a gravestone all over again.

On day four he finally asks out loud. _“Sherlock?”_

_“I have him on the phone, John.”_ Comes the odd answer from his therapist. _“Would you like to speak to him?”_ John stops in his tracks trying to understand what she’d just said. Then nods shyly, like an unsure child, following as she hands him the phone.

_“Sherlock?”_ he whispers, terrified, into the receiver. His hands shaking.

_“John,”_

_“Sherlock? Sherlock? Are you there?”_

_“I’m here, John.”_

_“Where’s here? Why can’t I see you? Why aren’t you here?”_

_“I’m at Baker Street, John.”_

_“I want you to be here, Sherlock, with me.”_

_“I can’t, John.”_

_“Please, Sherlock. Please. Come back.”_

_“I can’t come to you anymore, John. But you can come here, to Baker Street, if you like. I can arrange it with your doctor.”_

_“No! no! Here!”_

_“I think that’s enough, John.”_ Stravinsky intervenes, trying to take the phone from him. But John resists her.

_“No! I want him to come back. To be here. Sherlock!”_ he yells as she cuts the line.  
Two orderlies come in to help calm him. In all his time in the clinic, they haven’t known him to be angry. Only coolly detached. Yet now they must use a light sedative to make him calm down.

 

He wakes up an hour later, to find Stravinsky at his bedside. His anger flares instantly.

_“You’re angry,”_ she notes.

_“Yes, I’m fucking angry.”_ He spits out. _“You had me drugged. And you’ve taken Sherlock away.”_

_“No, John, I haven’t. You can talk to him on the phone again tomorrow.”_

_“I want him here! Why can’t he be here?”_

_“Because he lives at Baker Street, John.”_

_“He’s dead!"_ John heaves. _“Dead!_ _He can’t fucking be at Baker Street because he’s dead! He jumped off that roof and cracked his skull on the pavement and stopped breathing and his pulse flattened out under MY fingers. So don’t fucking lie to me.”_ he pants, losing his blaze. The resignation returning to his voice. _“He left me. And I’ve only just gotten him back,”_ he shakily points to his temple, _“and you’ve taken him away.”_

_“He’s not dead, John. I know this is hard to hear, difficult to understand, but he is not dead.”_

But John is not with her anymore. He’s curled into himself, murmuring quietly. _“We weren’t doing anything wrong when he was in my head. Why would you take him away?”_

Stravinsky gets up from her seat, holding something in her hand. _“Read these before our session tomorrow, John.”_ She sets the stack of folded newspapers at the foot of his bed and leaves.


	10. Apology

**10| Apology**

John takes his time to read over the newspaper clipping Stravinsky had left him, along with a note from Sherlock. _»This is the What. Molly will explain the How. If you want to hear it, I‘ll explain the Why at Baker Street. At home, John. Yours, -SH «_

The newspapers give him the general idea. Sherlock had faked his death in order to beat Moriarty at his own game. Which doesn’t make sense, since (John knows now,) Moriarty was dead before Sherlock had jumped. It also didn’t make sense that it took him over a year to come back because they’d cleared Sherlock’s name after a few months. There was something else, something missing. John rereads every word, scouring the articles for details until he figures what is wrong.

There is no word here from Sherlock. All these articles are written from outside perspectives: very little, basic information, which John suspects was carefully released by Mycroft; a lot of assumptions and speculations by reporters, some theories and rumours by various fan-club members. None of it from the man himself. ‘ _Because he’s dead_ ,’ John reaffirms for himself. Sherlock being alive goes against every logical matter John knows. And Sherlock cherished logic more than anything.  ‘ _Then who did you talk to yesterday on the phone?’_ Another voice, his own but another, asks confusingly. ‘ _Phones lie_ ,’ John answers.

\--

He finds Molly in Stravinsky’s office that afternoon. She’s trying very hard not to cry.

_“Molly?”_

_“I’m so sorry, John.”_

_“Why are you here?”_

_“I, …”_

_“I don’t need your pity, Molly. I know where I am, but I chose to be here, and I haven’t turned dimwitted.”_

_“No, John.”_ Molly collects herself, grappling at professionalism. _“I’m here to tell you how we faked Sherlock’s death.”_

 _“I don’t know that I care ‘How’, Molly.”_ His tone is hard and unyielding. Molly doesn’t know how to react to that. _“Were we friends, Molly?”_

_“Yes, John, I thought so,”_

_“And I’m supposed to believe that Sherlock is not dead, that he faked his death. That you helped him fake his death.”_

_“Y-yes,”_

_“So, you lied to me?”_

_“Y-yes, John, I’m really sorry.”_

_“Why should I believe you now?”_

_“That I’m sorry?”_

_“No, that he’s not dead.”_

_“Why would I lie about it?”_

_“Dunno, Molly. Why did you lie in the first place?”_

 

He turns to Stravinsky when he sees Molly is unable to hold her tears back anymore. His eyes and his tone challenging.  “ _I’ve read through these articles you’ve left me, and there is not one hard fact here, nothing directly from Sherlock. I know better to believe the media.”_

 _“You can talk to Sherlock whenever you want, John, he’s at Baker Street,”_ Stravinsky answers, unfazed.

_“Why isn’t he here? Why isn’t he coming here himself to tell me.”_

_“He has been here, he tried to tell you, and you wouldn’t believe he’s not in your head.”_ The look John gives her tells her he still doesn’t believe it. _“I saw him when he came to visit you, John. He sat in this office to talk to me. Every one of the staff members saw him with you. Other patients as well. How do explain that?_ ” John cannot answer, and she goes on. “ _How do you explain the second cup of tea you’d made, disappearing? It used to stay standing on the counter until it didn’t, because he came back.”_

 _“I saw him die,”_ John argues, suddenly unsure.

 _“No,”_ Molly speaks up, “ _you saw pixels that you turned into a picture. That’s how the plan was designed.”_

_“I felt his pulse flattening out.”_

_“Squash ball under the armpit.”_

_“There is a logical explanation for everything, John,”_ Stravinsky emphasizes. _“Even if it’s hard to make sense of it.”_ She takes a deep breath as if preparing for something. _“Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.”_

John's eyes go wide as he hears her words; Sherlock’s words. He pales and shakes in his seat.  _“How- ?”_

 _“He told me to tell you that,”_ Stravinsky admits. _“Said it’s that last thing he can think of, to make you see.”_

And with that, the floodgates crash open, and John breaks down, crying.


	11. Baker Street

**11| Baker Street**

John cries for two days straight, at times not even sure what it is he’s crying over. Sherlock being alive is supposed to be a good thing. It is a good thing. It’s just, so very confusing. John cries for the lost time, for the pain he’d been through, for his loneliness and despair; for Sherlock, for Sherlock being away from London, from home, from John. Then he asks to go to Baker Street, to see Sherlock for himself.

Sherlock waits for him on the doorstep of 221b.

_“Can you see a man, standing there?”_ John asks the cab driver, just to make sure.

_“Yes, sir.”_

 

_“Can you tell me what he’s wearing? Please?”_

_“A coal-grey suit. Posh looking. Are you alright, sir?”_

_“Yes, Fine. Thank you. Here’ll do.”_ John answers, taking the time to calm his breathing. Sherlock opens John’s door and pays the driver through the window, while John struggles out the cab, his cane leading.

They stand on the curb looking at each other, John’s look is now untrusting, more of what Sherlock had anticipated when he’d first appeared back in front of John.   
 _“John,”_ he says, softly. Secretly, he hopes John will lean into him, hold him as he did at the hospital, but he knows it’s too much now. Instead, he gestures to the house door. John looks at the door suspiciously, then squares his shoulders as if preparing for battle and goes inside. He looks at the 17 stairs leading to their apartment as if they were his worst enemy. He lets Sherlock go up first, his silence a plea for disregard. Then he bites his lip and clutches his cane and begins his ascent.

He’s breathing hard by the time he reaches the landing, leaning against the doorframe, taking in the sitting room. Everything is exactly as he remembers. The breath shudders in his lungs with relief and terror. Then he crosses to his chair and slumps into it, his head in hands, covering his face.

_“John?”_ comes Sherlock worried voice from beside him.

_“I can’t tell,”_ John beings shakily, _“I can’t tell if it’s real, or in my head.”_

_“It’s real, John. It’s all real.”_

John lifts his head to look at Sherlock. He’s taken his jacket off and is crouching at John’s side. John’s shaky hand stretches to caress at Sherlock’s cheek, just under his eye. Barely touching, disbelieving. _“How do I know you’re not just in my head?”_ John whispers.

_“Do you trust me, John?”_

_“Yes. But I don’t know if I trust my head anymore.”_

_“I’d like to show you something. May I show you something?”_

_“Mm,”_ John says, not following, but willing to listen. He can see Sherlock hesitating. Then, slowly, Sherlock’s fingers move to his shirt buttons, undoing them one by one. A shiver runs through John, at the oddity of this gesture, but his eyes cannot leave Sherlock's fingers. At last, all buttons are undone, and Sherlock hesitates again. John’s eyes climb to Sherlock’s, questioning, and Sherlock peels off his shirt, revealing his torso.

John gasps, his mouth opening, a small cry leaving it. He reaches a hand to Sherlock’s scar-poxed chest, up his shoulder. Sherlock turns at the tiniest of John’s touches, revealing his back, where John’s eyes follow along the scars. eventually, he turns back around to John, waiting for him to say something.

_“Why would I imagine you with such scars?”_ John asks, helpless.

_“You wouldn’t, you’re not,”_ Sherlock says, already pulling on his shirt. Folding it at the arms. John can see a long scar curling up Sherlock's left forearm. _“These are real, John. I am real._ _And every time you’re not sure, you can look, to know.”_

_“I couldn’t save you,”_ John mumbles sadly, clutching at the armrest of his chair.

_“I didn’t let you, I couldn’t. I am sorry.”_

_“Because I was a bad friend,”_

_“No, no, John. You were, are, the perfect friend. My best friend,”_

Something changes in John as he hears these words. Darkens. _“You left me,”_

_“Yes, I did,”_

_“You lied to me,”_

_“Yes, I did. There was no other way,”_

_“That’s not what friends do. Best friends.”_

_“No? Then what do they do, John, tell me? I always needed you to guide me in such things.”_

_“Friends protect people,”_ John says darkly, bitterly.

_“And that’s why I did it, John. To protect you, to keep you safe. Moriarty had snipers to follow you, to kill you if I didn’t die that day. It took me fourteen months to disassemble his web, to make sure you were, finally, safe.”_

John remains quiet, thinking things over and Sherlock gets up from the floor to sit on his own chair. It’s a long moment before John finally speaks again.

_“Why do get to be the one to make the ultimate sacrifice? Because you’re Sherlock Holmes?”_ his voice turns sours as he emphasizes the name.

_“No, John. Because I would not have been able, could not, keep living in a world in which you did not exist.”_

John looks at him for a long moment, his eyes full of sorrow. _“Neither could I,”_ he admits, seeing Sherlock understand, _“in a world without you.”_

_“I know,”_ Sherlock says, _“I know. But I’m back now, and I’d like you to come back into the world with me. To Baker Street, John, home.”_


	12. Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At first, this chapter was titled 'Epilogue' but now it's called 'Home'.

**12| Home**

It takes John a while to settle back into Baker Street. They go back to the hospital together, to sort it out with Stravinsky. John is released with a plan of therapy to ease his return into civil life. Sherlock promises to remain by his side for as long as John asks.

The first three days, John asks to see the scars so many times, Sherlock eventually leaves his shirt sleeves folded up, the ugly scar adorning his forearm constantly in sight.  
They go for walks together, stretching the distance and the pace every day, until John no longer needs his cane.    
When John wakes up at night, calling Sherlock’s name in the dark, Sherlock appears, turning on the light and helping him settle. He plays the violin for him again.  
Slowly, John dares to play the piano in Sherlock's presence, and sometimes, rarely, they play together, chuckling at their own nonsense.  
  


After another month, John returns to work, gradually building from half a day to three shifts a week, getting used to being temporarily separated from Sherlock. Sherlock takes on cases again. Small and unimportant at first, to get John back into the hang of things, then bigger, with the aid of Lestrade and the Yard. He takes more care to let John in on his plans, gets better at communicating where he is and where he’s going.

John doesn’t stop being as open and as truthful with Sherlock as he was at the hospital. It’s not an easy conversation when he finally, bravely, brings it up, but they get through it and find their own, steady way:

_“Sherlock,”_ John returns from therapy one day, seeming preoccupied, or worried. He sits in his chair and waits for Sherlock to react.

_“Mm,”_

_“I want to apologize,”_ John begins, cryptic and insecure.

_“What for?”_ Sherlock is intrigued enough to come sit in his chair, facing John. He can see something is bothering John.

_“At the hospital,”_ John begins, _“when I thought you were only in my head, it seems I was quite careless with touching you. I held you and leaned on you, and I’m not sure I ever asked if it was okay by you. If you agreed or even liked it. I’ve come to think, I may even have hurt you, without knowing. I’m sorry.”_

_“John, you didn’t hurt me much, and I know you weren’t aware of my injuries. There is no need to apologize for it.”_ Sherlock pauses in hesitation. _“I know such things were not part of our… partnership, before, but I didn’t mind it when you held me in the hospital. It was new, but I didn’t mind. I found I rather liked it.”_

John looks up at him, surprised. “ _You- ?”_

_“Yes, I liked it when you hugged me. I liked it when you leaned into me, when you lay against me in the bed.”_ Sherlock swallows thickly. _“I wouldn’t mind if that would continue being part of our connection now if you’d like it.”_

_“God yes, I would.”_ John smiles bashfully. His cheeks pinking. He hesitates and then plows bravely on. _“I also said some things, wrote them in the letters too, I know you’ve read them…”_

_“Yes, I have. And I remember what you said, and I’m not…”_ the words flit away with uncertainty.

Sherlock remembers thinking of John’s new-found determination to not miss out on opportunities. The ease with which he had revealed the depth of his feelings when he’d thought Sherlock to be a figment of his imagination…

_“I cherish our friendship, John. More than anything. I love you, too.”_ They stare at each other from across their chairs, both letting those words sink in, their din stands in the air around them.

Then Sherlock gently clears his throat, _“But,”_ he begins carefully, and the words feel heavy in his mouth, _“all the rest of it, of the physical attributes of such an intimate… relationship, as ours, I… I just don’t know yet. I’ve never really… experienced such things, such needs and…”_

_“Ever?”_ John blurts out, surprised, baffled. He’s unsure he’s succeeding to keep any judgment from his tone. Apparently not, looking at Sherlock’s expression. It’s the last thing he means, it’s just unfathomable for him to imagine. And then he thinks about the last year or so, in which his sexual needs were the furthest from his mind. _“Sherlock, it’s fine. We don’t need to-”_

_“I’m not saying no, John. We can try, if it’s something you want, I just…”_

_“Sherlock,”_ John leans forward, to be closer, his fingers twitching to towards Sherlock’s wrist, but undaring yet to touch _. “As slow as you want. Whatever you need. I promise. Holding you can be enough for me if that’s all you’re comfortable with. I never thought of…”_ ( _how is Sherlock going to react to this?_ ) “ _sex, when I was in the hospital. That wasn’t...”_

_“I know, I know, John. I… could we, would you…”_

_“What, Sherlock? Just ask, the answer is probably yes anyway.”_ John grins, and Sherlock relaxes and smiles back.

_“I’d like to hold you in bed, John. I’d like to sleep next to you and hold you when you have a nightmare. Just sleep, for now, but I’d like it if we shared a bed.”_

It’s Sherlock turn to turn pink, the blush creeping up his neck to the top of his ears. John has never seen a more endearing sight. He gets up from his chair, and stands in front of Sherlock, offering his hand. Sherlock looks John over, trying to deduce what he means; He’s and radiant and inviting. He slowly reaches to take John's hand in his, lets John help him to his feet. They stand close, facing each other, and John carefully laces his arms around Sherlock’s torso, like he did that very first time. He steps into Sherlock space, his ear against Sherlock’s chest, and holds him close.

Sherlock breathes him in. His proximity, his warmth, the security of his arms around him. Then he wraps his own arms around John, pulling him closer, miraculously folding himself into John.

They stand there, for an indeterminate amount of time, holding each other in the dust-speckled dimming light of a London evening in their home.

 

_“Dinner?”_ John finally asks without moving.

“S _tarving,”_ Sherlock whispers, not letting go in the slightest.

 

_\- Fin -_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, that's it..   
> thank you for reading,  
> hope you've enjoyed,  
> please feel encouraged to leave a comment,  
> Picpicpic


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